Kitty
by Gaurwen
Summary: Harry is almost ten when he meets a very unusual cat... Oneshot, AU beginning. Enjoy!


One bright sunshiny day, a certain boy named Harry Potter was up and about doing his chores and his cousin's chores like normal, when he spotted a tabby cat that was staring at him. Well, this wasn't all that odd, so he just went back to his work. When he was all done he looked at the place where the cat once stood, but the cat wasn't there any more, so he just went inside the house to tell his Aunt Petunia that he was done with his chores.

Later that day he went back out to weed the garden and saw that same cat, but this time it wasn't looking at him - it was staring at a book. Harry rubbed his eyes. He figured he must be imagining things, but when he looked at the cat it was still 'reading' the book. '_How strange,'_ Harry thought to himself. He watched the tabby a little longer, then went back to weeding the garden. While he finished weeding he hummed his favorite song, _Yellow Submarine _by the Beatles. When he did finish he glanced back at the spot where the cat was and found the animal missing.

He headed back to the house - but when he got to the porch steps he found the cat! Staring right at him! This unnerved Harry a little bit, so he started to talk to the cat. He was extremely surprised when the creature seemed to be listening to every word he was saying. This made him think, '_Wow, what an unusual cat!'_ Pretty soon he decided to try to see if the cat would let Harry pet it. Harry reached out his hand slowly, and he slowly and softly set it down on the cat and started to pet it. The cat began to purr.

"Wow, you must really like that, little kitty. Why are you so far from home? Are you a stray?" The cat shook its head as if to say, "No." This shocked Harry even more, but he kept petting it. Pretty soon he had to go inside, because Aunt Petunia was calling him. She wanted him to clean the bathroom, so Harry said goodbye to the cat and left.

-

The next day Harrywoke up, got out of bed, got dressed, tried to flatten down his hair, then went and made his aunt, uncle, and cousin some breakfast. When he finished making breakfast and eating his single helping of toast and a little bit of bacon, he went to fetch the newspaper for his Uncle.

When he went outside, there was the cat again. This time it wasn't reading a book or staring at him. It was reading the newspaper, and it looked like it was laughing to itself, like it was funny. Harry made a little coughing noise and the cat looked up at him. It just stared for a couple of seconds, then turned around and walked away. After it walked away, Harry picked up the newspaper. On his way back inside he looked through it to see if anything seemed the slightest bit funny, but it all seemed normal; nothing was funny, just boring. _'How can Uncle Vernon read this stuff?' _ he wondered.

Pretty soon he had to start doing his chores again. This time he hadto do an extra nice job or he would be locked in his cupboard for a week: tomorrow was Dudley's tenth birthday and he was going to have a party at the house instead of going somewhere for the day. So he got to work. Harry hated the days before Dudley's birthdays(though he also hated the days of Dudley's birthday) because he usually had to do every bit of cleaning twice, even if he had done an exceptional job on it.

Around lunch time Harry went outside to put something away. He went and put it away, then turned around and started heading back to the house but when he got close to the porch he saw the cat again. This time it was looking into the house from the wall that was separating the Dursley's and their neighbor's yards. Harry began to wonder if the cat belonged to one of their neighbors. He decided to ask the cat. It seemed to be pretty smart,

"Here kitty, kitty, kitty," he called. When the cat came to him, he asked, "Do you belong to one of the neighbors?" The cat shook its head. "Hmmmmm. Do you belong to someone down the street?" Again the cat shook its head. "Did you run away from your home?" The cat shook its head.

"Where did you come from?" he asked it. Of course the cat didn't answer, but Harry wished it would. He started to think about where the cat could have come from, but his Aunt's voice broke him out of thought.

"Harry!" she screeched. "Come inside and finish cleaning for Duddykins birthday."An upset and confused Harry went back inside and finished cleaning.

-

That night, Harry was thinking about the cat again. Cats around the neighborhood were not unusual, but this one was. _I wonder if that cat was sent to me by an Angel. Probably not, Aunt Petunia says angels don't exist. Maybe it is a cat runaway from the circus. _He dismissed that idea too, though, because why would a cat be in the circus? Pretty soon he fell asleep and started to dream, but it wasn't one of his usual dreams like the one where he heard screaming and a bright green light or the one with flying motorcycles. No, this one was about the cat.

-

_The cat was sitting on the porch and staring at Harry. He was beginning to wonder if it liked being at Number 4 Privet Dr. or if it just liked Harry. The cat started to move: first it licked its paws, then it got up and started to walk circles around Harry, as if inspecting him. Then it walked a little ways down the street, stopped, looked around as if to make sure that no one was looking, walked back to Harry, and turned into a stern looking lady. She smiled at Harry - and then nothing._

-

Harry woke with a start. _Wow - did that cat actually turn into a woman? What a strange dream._ But he fell back to sleep after about five minutes and had no more dreams for the rest of the night.

-

When Harry awoke the next morning he had forgotten all about the dream he had had the night before, dreading what he was going to have to do today to get away from Dudley and his gang . Aunt Petunia woke him up and made him cook breakfast again. So he got up and made the breakfast, listening while Dudley counted his presents and bragged of all the fun he was going to have at his birthday party that day. Harry quickly ate his breakfast and went to his cupboard so as to avoid Dudley.

When Dudley's friends got there, they made so much noise that Harry was sure that the neighbors would come over and ask if someone was hurt or something. But they never did. When the time came for lunch, Aunt Petunia said that he would be eating in his cupboard. So he ate what little lunch he got, then began to read. There wasn't much for Harry to read since he never got anything, not even a book, unless it was school books, but occasionally Dudley would throw one at Harry and Harry would get to keep it for a little while. When he finished he went out of his cupboard to go to the bathroom.

He got out of the bathroom and saw that Dudley was opening his presents from his friends. If Harry was quiet he would be able to sneak out quietly and enjoy the sun; it was such a gorgeous day outside. He quietly slipped outside and went over to a tree to sit down. The cat came over and sat next to him, so Harry began to pet it. Pretty soon, though, Dudley and his gang came outside. They took one look at Harry and decided that they wanted to play their favorite game, punch bag Harry, and headed over.

When Dudley got next to Harry he kicked him, but he didn't know that there was a cat right next to Harry. The cat lashed out and scratched Dudley and hissed. Dudley got really mad and began to throw sticks at the cat; soon his friends joined, but the cat jumped at Dudley and his gang and scratched each one of them so that they bled. Well, being as stupid as they were, Dudley and his gang thought that they were going to bleed to death, so they ran inside away from the cat and Harry and began to pester Aunt Petunia. Harry just stared. The cat, after it had scratched Dudley and his friends, just twitched its tail and sat down.

-

After the cat had scratched Dudley and his gang, Dudley stayed away from it, which meant he stayed away from Harry when Harry was with the cat. As a result, Harry got some peace and quiet every now and then, even if not much. The cat stayed at Number 4 Privet Drive for a whole year.

-

_**One Year Later:**_

It was a week after Dudley's eleventh birthday and Harry had just managed to get out of his cupboard. Somehow, on Dudley's birthday, he had managed to get in trouble: his Aunt and Uncle thought that he had set a snake on Dudley at the Zoo. No matter how much Harry tried to convince them that there was no possible way he could do it, he still got a week's punishment in his cupboard with little food. Today he was allowed out, but that just meant he was back to cooking breakfast and doing all the chores again. But it also meant he could see the cat again, and he was very happy about that, as the cat was his only friend.

He got up, cooked breakfast, and went to fetch the mail. When he picked up the mail, he looked through it like usual. He found a postcard from Aunt Marge, who was in Majorca, and a bill, but he also found a letter for himself. Wait - was that right? A letter for him? That couldn't be right. But it was clear as day:

Mr. Harry Potter

Cupboard Under the Stairs

Number 4 Privet Dr.

Why would anyone be writing him? He had no friends other than the cat, but it couldn't write a letter. It couldn't write at all. So who would? He went into the kitchen and gave Uncle Vernon the rest of the mail, then sat down and began to slowly open up is letter. Dudley saw him and yelled. "Dad! Harry's got a letter!"

"What?" Uncle Vernon asked. "Give it here boy!" he demanded.

"No! It's for me," replied Harry.

"Why would anyone write you?" said Uncle Vernon, then he snatched the letter out of Harry's had and began to rip it open.

"Petunia," he gasped "it's, it's from, from….." Vernon held the letter up for Petunia. Petunia took one look at it and almost fainted from the sight.

"Out! Out! Both of you!" Vernon yelled, and pushed Harry and Dudley out of the room. Harry and Dudley got in a silent fight over who could listen at the knob hole on the door. Dudley won. So Harry, with his glasses dangling from his nose, listened through the space between the door and the ground.

"Its happened!" gasped Aunt Petunia. "I knew it would come and it did!"

"Now, now, dear," soothed Uncle Vernon. "We won't put up with this nonsense, we'll just ignore it. If he never shows up then they'll think that he just doesn't want to come and leave us well alone."

This calmed Aunt Petunia and they stopped talking, so Harry and Dudley were allowed back in the kitchen. When they came back in Uncle Vernon ripped up the letter right in front of Harry's face and laughed. Sad and confused, Harry went outside and looked for the cat. The tabby was sitting under Harry's favourite tree. He went over to sit next to it.

"Hi, Kitty," (he'd decided to name the cat that because he was tired of cat) Harry said while he began to pet Kitty "I just got a letter from someone and I don't know who it's from or what was inside of it. It said my name right on the front plain as day, but Uncle Vernon took it from me for no reason whatsoever. Do you think you know who it came from?" asked Harry, not really expecting an answer.

To his amazement, Kitty nodded its head. Harry decided that Kitty was just nodding its head because it didn't understand what Harry was saying. This left Harry even more confused. Pretty soon Harry had to get to his chores, so he left Kitty, went to his chores, and didn't come back outside for the rest of the day.

-

The next morning Harry got two of the same letters from the same person in the same script. But Uncle Vernon took those, too, and burned them in the fireplace. Because of the letters, Aunt Petunia decided to move Harry to Dudley's second bedroom. Harry semi-liked his new room, but he would rather be in his cupboard with the letter and Kitty, even though he knew Kitty would never be aloud in the house.

He moved what few things he had into his new room. When he got up there he found Kitty on the window sill.

"What are you doing here?!" Kitty just licked its paws and stared at Harry. Since Kitty came up on the window sill and neither Aunt Petunia or Uncle Vernon knew, Harry was a little happier, but he still wanted his letter. The next day he got a dozen letters. Uncle Vernon stayed home and hammered up the mail slot, leaving a confused mailman to hand them the mail through the window. The next day two dozen letters got pushed under the door so Uncle Vernon hammered underneath the door. The day after, about a hundred letters came down the chimney. This time Harry made a grab for a letter and almost got away with it before Uncle Vernon snatched it away. Then Kitty came down from Harry's room and the hairs on its back stood up.

"What is that cat doing in MY house?" bellowed Uncle Vernon.

"I, I don't know Sir," replied Harry

"Get it OUT! Now!" Harry took Kitty outside and Kitty sat down on the porch and stared at Harry, then the cat got up and circled Harry as if inspecting him. Then Kitty walked down the street as if to make sure that no one was looking, came back to Harry, and changed into a stern looking lady.

"Bloody Hell!"

"Language, Mr. Potter."

"Umm… sorry Miss. Um, beg my pardon but who are you?"

"My name is Professor Minerva McGonagall. I am a teacher and Professor at Hogwarts, the school that keeps sending you letters." Well, this explained where the letters came from, but who was she, and where was Kitty?

"I have been watching you and trying to make sure you had at least one friend for the past year. I am a witch, and you, Harry Potter, are a wizard."

"But, but I can't be a wizard."

"Yes, you can. Are you questioning my sanity, Mr. Potter?" Harry immediately shook his head, not wanting to have this strange lady mad at him.

"Have you ever made strange things happen when you were scared or angry?" Harry thought about it and his face told McGonagall the truth. He had.

"See, you are a wizard, Mr. Potter. Now about that letter: I need to talk with your aunt and uncle." Harry nodded and let McGonagall inside to see Aunt Petunia and Uncle Vernon. When they got inside, his aunt screamed and his Uncle began to talk to McGonagall.

"Hello, Miss. Who are you?"

"I am Professor McGonagall from Hogwarts. I believe that you have been keeping Mr. Potter's Hogwarts letter from him. I would like to give it to him now." She pulled out one of the letters and gave it to Harry.

"Wow!" said Harry after he read the letter. "I'd really like to go, but I don't have any money, and I don't think Aunt Petunia and Uncle Vernon would pay for me."

"You don't have to worry about money, Mr. Potter. Now, if there are no further questions from you two," she said, pointing to Vernon and Petunia, "then I am going to take Mr. Potter out." Then she took Harry and shut the door behind them. Harry just stared at her and began to think. After a little while Harry decided to ask a question.

"Umm. Beg my pardon Miss but where are we going?"

"We are going to the Wizarding World to get some tea and biscuits."

Harry soon decided that he liked this stern woman. He also decided he liked the Wizarding World.


End file.
